Generation Y less likely to drive

[Simon_Jester]

Being able to keep an old jalopy (like that Vauxhall, or like Duchess's station wagon) running is a slightly difficult art. I imagine a lot of people in our generation would find themselves getting railroaded into paying much bigger repair bills and doing less of the work themselves when bits fall off the car. That makes the car less palatable- when you're paying more in repairs per year than you'd get by selling off the car, and it can get that bad... just being rid of the beast is a temptation.

I wonder how many people who came of age in the '70s and '80s didn't get a car early on. It's probably more than the negligible number the article implies.

[fordlltwm]

Being able to keep an old jalopy (like that Vauxhall, or like Duchess's station wagon) running is a slightly difficult art. I imagine a lot of people in our generation would find themselves getting railroaded into paying much bigger repair bills and doing less of the work themselves when bits fall off the car. That makes the car less palatable- when you're paying more in repairs per year than you'd get by selling off the car, and it can get that bad... just being rid of the beast is a temptation.

I wonder how many people who came of age in the '70s and '80s didn't get a car early on. It's probably more than the negligible number the article implies.

That's possibly true, both the cars I'm insured on are mid 90's vehicles that do require some maintenance and are getting to the point where esoteric fault finding is occasionally required.
I'm in process of changing the steering box on one of them for the MOT, whilst the other one required a new earth strap to solve an electrical issue, would've probably cost a fortune to get a garage to do either, especially fault finding the electrical fault.

[Zaune]

Not owning a car is a personal finance and convenience decision, but not being able to drive is a career limiting move. You are significantly restricting your employment options (reachable areas, range from house, ease of getting interviews, even ease of finding a new house when moving), you are making it harder to get to training and off-site meetings and you are losing the ability to quickly respond to a lot of emergencies.

Which is somewhat academic if you don't have enough earning potential to pay for petrol, insurance, tax and whatever monthly payments you can talk the dealer into with enough left over for living expenses. I don't have any hard numbers right now but I very much doubt it's feasible on minimum wage.

[fordlltwm]

Once you pass 25 insurance costs hit the floor, a friend turned 25 and his insurance went from 1300 to 130 overnight. Other things like it's possible to get a early 90's eurobox for a couple of hundred with a couple of years life left in it which will allow people to at least get around without having to rely on a unreliable bus service.

130 over 12 months comes out at £10 a month, if it's only going to last a couple of years don't maintain it £0, can't remember what tax on a 90's era small car is atm, but it probably comes out at £30/month fixed costs plus fuel to go anywhere. If you're willing to pick up hitchikers at night you can sometimes get a couple of quid off them (I don't ask but have been given money before now).

[someone_else]

Which is somewhat academic if you don't have enough earning potential to pay for petrol, insurance, tax and whatever monthly payments you can talk the dealer into with enough left over for living expenses. I don't have any hard numbers right now but I very much doubt it's feasible on minimum wage.

What about the jobs that would require you to drive something owned by the company? Besides, you can share a car with friends just like you share an apartment.

Here if you don't have a driver licence AND a car (while the car owner is actually a older guy to avoid leaving fucktons of money to the insurance) you get laughed off when job-interviewing. Also because pubblic transport is limited and pretty expensive.

[TheFeniX]

Also in the college I was at (suburban community college) there was a noticeable clique of people from the anime club and whatnot who did not have licenses for random reasons so they bummed rides from people or picked each other up or had family members provide rides etc.

It's nice they have people they can burden to bum rides. Not to say carpooling isn't a good thing, but this reminds me of my (soon to be) brother-in-law who went off on on some spiel about not needing a truck, bad gas mileage, not worth the money, etc. Yet when he needs something moved, who does he call? This asshole right here who owns a pickup truck. Would be nice if he filled the fucking tank up for once......

As for car maintenance, it really depends on what you buy. I had an old 1992 Ford Ranger that I rolled the odometer on twice (so 200k+ miles) and which had 180k miles when I bought it. Besides oil changes and tires, the master cylinder went out on it once. Other than that... well, I bet money that ugly POS is still out there somewhere racking up the miles. It'll definitely outlast what I'm driving now.

[Zaune]

What about the jobs that would require you to drive something owned by the company? Besides, you can share a car with friends just like you share an apartment.

Very few companies will hire you for a job driving their vehicles before you're 25 for insurance reasons, doubly so if you haven't got a lot of practical experience behind the wheel. And sharing a car with friends strikes me as impractical at best and a recipe for disaster at worst; the insurance company won't much like it, its running costs are another half-dozen responsibilities to bicker with your housemates about and try to pass the buck on, and if one of you commits a driving offence then you could all suffer for it.

[Sky Captain]

I do not own a car however I can borrow one from my dad if the need arises so actually having one is not that important. Here if you have some office job or something that don't require driving around and you happen to live in area with decent public transport it is possible to live without a car. Hovever having a drivers license is very useful even if you don't plan to own a car because it opens up new job possibilities. Besides getting a license takesaro und 3 - 5 months, but you can buy cheap used car anytime if a need arises

[Slacker]

I'd have to agree that insurance costs plummet once you're no longer part of the "High Risk Age group"-my wife is 29, I'm 31, and our combined insurance costs are about a hundred bucks a month. Neither of us have squeaky clean driving records either.

That said, I certainly delaying purchasing a car. I didn't drive regularly until I was about 26. Not having a car hampers you in the suburbs, the bus and train service on Long Island are not especially good. Long Island pretty much requires you to own a car to get by.

[Julhelm]

Very few companies will hire you for a job driving their vehicles before you're 25 for insurance reasons, doubly so if you haven't got a lot of practical experience behind the wheel.

Says who? I have several friends who have been driving professionally since 18. Several of these were truck drivers in the Army and promptly got hired as truckers when they discharged. I hate to say this, but you sound like the kind of guy who loses out on potential opportunities before even trying just because you have these preconcieved ideas that "it's no use anyway".

[Questor]

The way I see it, and I have to admit to living in a suburban area and having a job that requires me to use private transportation to be able to achieve goals, having a car may or may not be a good idea (as Starglider said), but I'm not seeing a downside in having a driver's license.

Of course, this is a US perspective, where insurance is generally required for and associated with vehicle ownership, and for occasional use, a licensed driver is covered - at least at minimal levels - under the owners policy.

If the UK requires insurance for simply having a license, then that might change my evaluation.

[Zaune]

Says who? I have several friends who have been driving professionally since 18. Several of these were truck drivers in the Army and promptly got hired as truckers when they discharged.

Says the guy behind the desk at a firm with a "Drivers Wanted" sign in the window when I asked him about it last year, as it happens. Not a very representative selection, I admit, but I've no particular reason to believe it's somehow exceptional.

I hate to say this, but you sound like the kind of guy who loses out on potential opportunities before even trying just because you have these preconcieved ideas that "it's no use anyway".

My preconceived notions are based on the fact that I must have sent out about a hundred and fifty job applications a year since 2008 and been invited in for three interviews, none of which resulted in an offer.

[Simon_Jester]

...That sounds like Julhelm may have a point, to tell the truth. Even given how bad unemployment is, your personal experience of "no one ever follows up and tries to get an interview with me" isn't going to translate well into "I know the hiring standards of the industries that refused to hire me."

Now if, say, you've had it repeatedly explained to you by the hiring companies that no one was going to hire a 23-year-old driver for commercial vehicles, that's another story.

There may also be a difference between Britain, the US, and Finland. Different countries have different regulations on who can and should drive, and people coming out of the army are usually more trusted on general principles. If they've got good recommendations, it's a sign that they can do a job like drive trucks even under bad conditions, and in a place where they will be shouted at very effectively for failure.

[His Divine Shadow]

Finland is in general a very sparsely populated country and actually one of the least urbanized countries in europe. Suits me though, I like it. My "city" of 60k is feeling a bit too large even as it is, would like to move further out someday, a rowhouse with garage* would be ideal. Electric car can't come fast enough.

*No car would fit in the garage, it'd be too filled with machines and tools

[someone_else]

What about the jobs that would require you to drive something owned by the company? Besides, you can share a car with friends just like you share an apartment.

Very few companies will hire you for a job driving their vehicles before you're 25 for insurance reasons, doubly so if you haven't got a lot of practical experience behind the wheel. And sharing a car with friends strikes me as impractical at best and a recipe for disaster at worst; the insurance company won't much like it, its running costs are another half-dozen responsibilities to bicker with your housemates about and try to pass the buck on, and if one of you commits a driving offence then you could all suffer for it.

Different laws I guess. Here the insurance does not give a shit about who actually uses the vehicle, it's just pretty high if the owner is less than 30 (probably a bit less now, they change that every now and then). And most commercial vehicles have a "all-inclusive" insurance (covers damage done to you AND dealt by you up to X) anyway because it's far far cheaper than paying a legal team to sort out the weird shit that happens when you have dozens of vans zipping around all day in a crowded city. Heck even serious transport firms (those with hundreds of big trucks doing international trips) do that.

[folti78]

What about the jobs that would require you to drive something owned by the company? Besides, you can share a car with friends just like you share an apartment.

Very few companies will hire you for a job driving their vehicles before you're 25 for insurance reasons, doubly so if you haven't got a lot of practical experience behind the wheel. And sharing a car with friends strikes me as impractical at best and a recipe for disaster at worst; the insurance company won't much like it, its running costs are another half-dozen responsibilities to bicker with your housemates about and try to pass the buck on, and if one of you commits a driving offence then you could all suffer for it.

Different laws I guess. Here the insurance does not give a shit about who actually uses the vehicle, it's just pretty high if the owner is less than 30 (probably a bit less now, they change that every now and then). And most commercial vehicles have a "all-inclusive" insurance (covers damage done to you AND dealt by you up to X) anyway because it's far far cheaper than paying a legal team to sort out the weird shit that happens when you have dozens of vans zipping around all day in a crowded city. Heck even serious transport firms (those with hundreds of big trucks doing international trips) do that.

This. Limiting insurance to drivers over the local "still danger on wheels" age would play merry hell with logistics at every business where drivers are assigned to whatever vehicle is available at the moment. Or where a vehicle has multiple drivers working in multiple shifts. It's more saner for the insurance companies to offer different packages for businesses, than for private owners. At least that's how they do it here (owner's person: male, female, company). Also for transportation companies, there can be further requirements for their drivers, like additional training over the normal driving license.

[madd0ct0r]

depends how big the company is.

When 18 and I was still working for a tiny manufacturing company I asked the owner if he wanted me on the van's insurance as a back up option (the regular drivers occasionally turned up hungover, or called in from a cell). He laughed for about 5 minutes.

[folti78]

Indeed. For a larger/better funded company this kind of cost cutting will quickly became anti-productive.

[Starglider]

My preconceived notions are based on the fact that I must have sent out about a hundred and fifty job applications a year since 2008 and been invited in for three interviews, none of which resulted in an offer.

So what? That's a pathetic rate of application and actually a fairly high rate of uptake. Most of my experience (trying to sell contracting / consulting) is not directly comparable, but a friend of mine recently went through this process and sent out over 1000 applications to full time positions in less than three months. I gather this was tedious but not hard with online job boards and a few template cover letters. He got a handful of interviews and then eventually hired. That is what it takes in an era where jobs are listed online and everyone (with a clue) applies for everything.

[Simon_Jester]

Stipulating that, it's probably also one reason people keep running back to school and racking up massive college loans. If you've got an advanced degree, you get to look for job openings that don't have so many applicants that HR winds up throwing out three quarters of the resumés they see in self-defense...

That said, a ratio of applications to interviews on the order of 1% is a sign that someone in the process really ought to be filtering better; it's a terrible waste of time on both ends of the system when you think about it, especially if those positions aren't getting filled fast.

[Broomstick]

EDIT 2: I wonder how much money would be spent on insurance and gas if I drove a car (i dont need to get a car, just insurance and gas upgrades and probably a share of maintenance costs).

If I recall, you live in Chicago, correct?

I had a license when I moved to Chicago but didn't drive for most of the 15 years I lived there. There are some advantages to being able to drive even if you don't do so often. One option exercised by many in Chicago is to forgo car ownership and just rent one when you happen to need one. Insurance for the rental period is available for renters (in fact, in some cases you have to ask to have it specifically left off if you don't want it). In that way you only pay for as much car as you actually need.

Of course, that does require you to get a license in the first place, but unless they've changed the laws in Illinois since I've lived there maintaining that license is trivially easy once you have it, you just have to renew it every 5 years and as long as you don't have any violations (very easy if you don't drive!) you won't have to take another road test.

[PainRack]

You folks are making me feel old damn it.......

I picked up my driving license because of job oppurtinities, as having one opened up several career routes...... All of which I did not participate in. I also realised it was dumb to expect a bus company to hire me at such a tender age because of the arcturial risk of accidents.
I wonder if that's a factor in anyone decision to take a license?

[Julhelm]

My preconceived notions are based on the fact that I must have sent out about a hundred and fifty job applications a year since 2008 and been invited in for three interviews, none of which resulted in an offer.

So what? That's a pathetic rate of application and actually a fairly high rate of uptake. Most of my experience (trying to sell contracting / consulting) is not directly comparable, but a friend of mine recently went through this process and sent out over 1000 applications to full time positions in less than three months. I gather this was tedious but not hard with online job boards and a few template cover letters. He got a handful of interviews and then eventually hired. That is what it takes in an era where jobs are listed online and everyone (with a clue) applies for everything.

The thing with online job listings though is that they always have a contact phone no (for more information call...) so anyone with a clue phones that number first to talk with a live human, mentions interest in the position and your credentials, THEN send in the CV if they haven't asked you to come in for an interview already. HR today has so many automated keyword-vetting resume filters that your chance of making it through that way is like playing the lottery. Whereas if you talk to someone they'll either tell you to fuck off or tell you to submit your stuff so they can look at it and then your odds increase.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

So what? That's a pathetic rate of application and actually a fairly high rate of uptake. Most of my experience (trying to sell contracting / consulting) is not directly comparable, but a friend of mine recently went through this process and sent out over 1000 applications to full time positions in less than three months. I gather this was tedious but not hard with online job boards and a few template cover letters. He got a handful of interviews and then eventually hired. That is what it takes in an era where jobs are listed online and everyone (with a clue) applies for everything.

Starglider's right. When doing online job aps/responses in the past few years I tried to average 70 - 80 a week. From that number I usually managed one interview; and based on my experience I succeeded in getting hired for a position once per ten interviews. Since some were temp jobs I have gone through the process five times in the past five years and those numbers held out fairly consistently in the 2007 - 2009 period where I held most of the jobs (I've maintained the same one since 2009--present, where I'm moving and finished my degree, so it's less applicable).

Before I secured a path forwards after graduating I decided -- first I'd apply to a tranche of a dozen schools or so. If none of them gave me full ride stipends as a researcher, I'd start applying for jobs. My goal was to apply for every single job a mechanical engineer would be qualified to perform within the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand that involved thermo/fluids applications, since that's what I specialized in while in school. I would then widen the parabolic to include Britain, France, Belgium, Germany, and Austria, i.e., expanding out to countries where my rusty language skills could compliment the international business use of language until I adapted. Then would come applications for jobs in the durable goods industry regardless of specialization. At the bottom of the list were things like "chinese mine in Angola", but I wasn't going to stop until I had a respectably paid engineering position. I will note I applied for a position with a mining operation in Nunavut in the first tranche though and actually had a phone interview for it.

Even professionally, in short, you have to be prepared to put out, say, at least 30 resumes/wk. When an unskilled college student trying to triple that number of applications would be a very good idea. That's just how the world works, you see, in the present economy you can't really expect a ratio of about 1 interview per 70 applications. If you're a skilled worker, perhaps one in thirty. Zaune did good for himself.

[Starglider]

The thing with online job listings though is that they always have a contact phone no (for more information call...)

I don't list a phone number when posting jobs and AFAIK most companies don't either, for the simple reason that if you did you'd be swamped with calls, mostly from completely useless people. Looking on say Monster or JobServe, the vast majority of applications are 'email preferred' and the ones that do list phone numbers will be for HR departments and recruiters with no actual knowledge of the job.

HR today has so many automated keyword-vetting resume filters that your chance of making it through that way is like playing the lottery.

Yes it is - but the tickets are free (if you have an Internet connection). This is simple maths; with many hundreds of applications for each position, the mean number of applications each job seeker has to send before getting a job is several hundred. A good CV and being good at interviews can cut it down to tens, but if your CV is light and you suck at interviews (i.e. you don't practice the skill) then expect to send thousands.

Whereas if you talk to someone they'll either tell you to fuck off or tell you to submit your stuff so they can look at it and then your odds increase.

Certainly it's worth trying to drill through to people who can actually make hiring decisions, but practically this is very hard without inside connections (because everyone is trying to do it and managers have very little time). So that should be in addition to rather than instead of posting your CV to everything on Monster etc that vaguely matches your skillset. Check the company's website, pick the most appropriate cover letter out of your set of six templates, insert company name, done. You can check if you actually want the job if they offer you an interview.

Of course this works significantly better if you have a car as you can apply to anything in driving range, or anything in the country if you are single and mobile, without having to worry about whether it is near public transport.

Starglider's right. When doing online job aps/responses in the past few years I tried to average 70 - 80 a week.

I'd note that the basic 'jobseeker's agreement' to receive unemployment benefit in the UK is two job applications a week. That's 100 applications per year bare minimum to qualify for state handouts, although job center staff are not very motivated to check this.